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Wednesday, February 6, 2013

Today we hit two retail oriented shows - Tucson Bead Show and To Bead True Blue. I did check out the Craftoptics magnifying glasses and they are quite cool. Buying them will have to wait though - since my budget is expended in beads and gems right now ... I found some beautiful ceramic beads and drops - didn't take a single picture - aagghh! And I'm too tired to dig out the company name right now. All I did at this show was get information about wholesale pricing and examine their products.

After a quick lunch and a Starbucks stop we headed to Lucky Gems to paw through their pearls in Holidome before the hoards descend on opening day tomorrow. I found some beautiful pearls and had fun letting Susan (here she is with her hands covering her face - her boss didn't want pictures taken of the employees - but saying no just encourages me to disobey - oops!)

The boss did let her take a picture of me with the sea of pearls in the background.

Susan also helped me out last year so it was fun to meet and talk with the same person 2 years in a row. Here are some of the pretties I bought ...

From Lucky Gems it was off to GJX with time to visit only one vendor. Since I wanted to make sure I got some of the remaining sterling silver stock from Ezel Findings I went there first. I finally got to meet Sun Young in person! Yay! Did I take a picture? No ... Booo!!! I was glad she still has some of her old sterling silver stock. Because of cost they are switching to plated brass ... wah!

Well since I'm falling asleep as I write this that must mean it's time to hit the sack. Good night all and tomorrow I join the Holidome madness ....

Tuesday, February 5, 2013

We saw him on day 3 and he's at the Kino Gem and Mineral Show (aka TEP). He has some friends that are for sale as well.

Today we stopped by the GIGM Grant Inn show on the way to the Arizona/Sonora Desert Museum. I was quite disappointed at the show. Triveni, which used to sell nice sterling, now only sells cheap stuff. Needless to say they are off my list of vendors to see. The rest of the stuff was a lot of import $1-$3 beads, African creations and beads and, of course, already made jewelry. Nothing that I got excited about.

After that we headed to the Desert Museum. This is always a fun place to visit since it is a hiking museum. The wonderful Sonoran desert is the museum - with some manmade exhibits to help you learn more about the area around you. The ocotillo, some barrel cactus and some salvias are starting to bloom so we saw splashes of color here and there. Most of the critters were napping so we mostly got to see their backs as they were curled up to sleep. Here are some of the critters ...
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An ocelot trying to get comfortable for his nap ...

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I think he wants to know what the heck I'm looking at ... The prarie dogs are always fun to watch!

Kathy and Susan with the Sonoran desert behind them

We had lunch at the restaurant inside the museum and it was quite good. And this one dessert was easily shared by all 3 of us. Doesn't it look delish?

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Last stop in the museum was the hummingbird aviary with many nesting hummers ...

As we headed out we stopped to get a picture with one of the big, old saguaros along the way ...

Kathy and Susan looking very small in front of a very tall and very old saguaro cactus

We had to start out day 4 with a stop at Starbuck's for the 2 Starbuck's addicts in the car (Mom and college roomie Kathy). Then we headed back to The Rock Show (or more commonly knows as RV Park) so Kathy could check out the polished slices to see if she just had to have some for coasters ... and she did. This time I did remember to take pictures of Bob and Pharoah of Really Old Rocks. Wow - I remembered the picture and to include a link to his web page! I'm getting back into the proper swing of things ...

FYI - Pharoah is the pretty, brown guy standing on his back legs ...

Next we hit the Barn at The Rock Show to check out one of the vendors that was closed on Sunday. I was soooo glad we did. They had some gorgeous, American, semi-precious gemstones. Gorgeous jaspers and agates - some I'd seen before, some I haven't. Here is just a taste of what I found ...

Willow Creek Jasper from Idaho

Gorgeous sage amethyst from Nevada and more jaspers (I'm too tired to go open the bag to dig out the name)

I got quite a few other stones there - but the pictures didn't come out too well. Of course I forgot to take a picture of Leanne and you'll have to wait until I get home for me to update this post with the name and web link...

Next it was back to TEP (aka the Kino Gem and Mineral show) and another of my favorite gemstone suppliers - Royal Quality Gems - owned by Chun and Jennifer Ho. They always have wonderful, quality gemstones at very reasonable prices. I had a good time shopping there. The pictures only show the gems that actually photographed well since I didn't want to remove them from their protective sleeves.

Chun and Jennifer - the very gracious owners who only carry quality gemstones in their stock

Gorgeous turquoise and oh-so-hard-to-find river stone!

More turquoise, onyx and lovely rhodocrosite

﻿From here we next headed back to G&LW Gem Mall to replace some cultured sea glass (aka manmade sea glass) at Znet that Kathy accidently dropped and to go in search of faceted, skinny, but not too long onyx drops. Here is some of the manmade sea glass I purchased yesterday and today at Znet - I love it!

It took quite a bit of searching to find the onyx drops (very Goldilocks in feel - this drops too small, this drops too big ... oh,, yay, this drop is just right!) and in the process of looking I found other beads that I just had to have ...

And that, my friends, was that. We headed back to the condo, Kathy, my kitchen beautician, colored my hair to turn some of that blondie-grey into just blondie ... And now it's time to hit the sack. More on our adventures tomorrow!

Sunday, February 3, 2013

Day 2 we got a bit of a late start but we began the day at the Pueblo Gem and Mineral Show.

My first stop is always Larimar Conlight for their beautiful larimar stones. Here are Jens and Cynthia...

Some of the beautiful larimar and some pink opal brios I got from Larimar Conlight. The brios are a beautiful pink - but I don't have the best lighting setup here in the condo so they look a bit orange and ick ...

My mom and I at Larimar Conlight

Some of the fun crew at Yaushing Gems

Me at Yaushing Gems - I did not get this gals name - bad me!

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Some meteorite beads from the Pueblo show

Some cabs I bought at Pueblo Gem and Mineral show

﻿﻿ Next it was onto J&GM Simpson Street ...

One of the huge gems/minerals out front at J&GM Simpson Street

The first person I visit at JG&M and usually on the first day of the show is Toyo Feng. Feng's Trading has beautiful gemstones at fair prices. I got some beautiful green pyrite - and bought almost all he had it was so cool looking!

More amethyst out front at J&GM

Some of the beautiful stones I got from Toyo...

and more ... I love the micanite purple, green and flashes of mica!

And more ...

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﻿Today was day 3 and we visited Toyo again, then briefly went through TEP (Tucson Electric Park aka Kino Gem and Mineral Show) looking for my favorite tool maker, Miland Seuss. He was not there - I hope he's OK! Then we tagged along with another jeweler friend to the back of TEP to the RV Park show. We've never been to that and we had a blast. I totally forgot to take pictures but we'll be heading back there tomorrow. I wore my college roomie out so she hung at the condo today. Meanwhile my mom is still going strong with me to the shows! Yay Mom!

Well our condo WIFI is not working so posting on the internet is a bit of a pain since the wired connection is in one of the bedroom's - and it isn't my bedroom. Anyway here's a quick synopsys of some neat things we've done/seen in Tucson...

Day 1 - The three of us gals posing in the beautiful back yard of our condo in north Tucson

Linda and Elven at Elven Stones (beautiful turquoise!)

Beautiful turquoise from the Nevada Turquoise Co - one of my first visits when I arrive in Tucson!